Fadeout in White
by Anna Marcelli Palmer
Summary: You killed me by killing yourself.


**This works as a sequel to "Fellow Freak", but it can be read independently. No idea why you'd want to read it though.**

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 **Fadeout in White**

 ** _a story by A.M. Palmer_ **

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Fucking _**BITCH**._

Always above everybody else. Always drawing those paranoid conclusions.

As though your whole life were a bloody article on _the American Psychologist_. _You did this because that. You don't like me. You find me ugly. You like that chick over there_. _You are just saying this because you are insecure._

Fucking bitch.

Crumpling and un-crumpling this goddamned hate letter. I suspect the only reason I am not choking on my own tears right now is because I am too flabbergasted by all this surreal mess. It is as though I am viewing the world through the eyes of someone else. As though you simply vanished in thin air, in that small puffy cloud of mundane magic that always surrounded you. You did attract all this theatrical drama, after all.

Burning yourself in your own apartment and then leaving behind this poison-riddled little testimony, an enthusiastic reminder of your stupendous opinion of me and what a freak I am. Yep. Sounds like you, to be honest.

I mean, this is bloody hilarious. You get pissing drunk, compose a grandiose ode to your passion/hatred towards me in order to reassure your pathetic little self, and then go set a wall on fire. Out of all possible ways to handle a situation, you choose to do all of that. But of course. Now that you are dead, I am and will always be -officially!- the villain. No matter what my version of the story might be, it doesn't matter anymore, because _you fucking committed suicide because of me._

It is approximately the fortieth time I am reading this lame confession of your oh-so-unconditional, undying, supposedly unrequited love, and yet it still makes me want to punch things until they somehow melt. It is the only copy I managed to confiscate while at the police station, where they had dragged us all -me and all of our mutual friends- and showered us with questions on your favorite subject. Which is, well... _you_.

Seriously now, are you enjoying your newly obtained status as a martyr? Feeling like a saint, much? Always taken advantage of, always the victim, never the one to blame or abuse others emotionally.

I am stuck in the traffic on my way back from the remains of your former home. No idea why this dawned on me, but I simply had to be there, see for myself the results of whatever might have transpired within that pretty head of yours. One wall was completely missing. Your furniture, your belongings, things I could immediately recognize and place in specific memories; all were covered in a thick layer of cinder. I fucking hate cinder. It renders everything heartbreakingly colorless, grey and impersonal. Like a bleak reminder of the place we come from and inevitably return to.

A part of your bed, a couple of appliances, and of course, your laptop somehow survived critical damages, they said. Bloody witch. You said I wasn't supposed to read any of that stuff. You said it'd be for the better. And yet, coincidentally, your goddamn laptop was found in such a good condition the goddamn police were able to recover your goddamn files.

One hand around the steering wheel, the other wrapped like a spider around your idea of a gift goodbye. Remote sounds of horns and enthusiastic profanities shouted by impatient drivers reach the ears aloof and distorted. I realize the road ahead of me is now empty, and annoyed citizens are speeding by the stopped car. One of them, a skinny bespectacled fox, sticks his forearm out of the open window, gracing me with a raised middle finger.

I laugh, not really understanding why. Maybe it reminds me of the glorious coda of your hate-fest. _I stick a proud middle finger in your honor. By all means, fuck you._

Fuck me, right?

I should probably cover the remaining distance to my house hovering on my boots, rather than stay stuck in this hellhole- but it is better like this; I doubt my two feet can carry me safely anywhere at this point of cosmic madness. A policewoman gradually becomes visible through the rearview mirror, ordering me to pull over. She is a bat, and her tight attire embraces her curves, so instead of following her signals I speed up and make sure she disappears from my field of vision.

My head is tangled in a buzzing headache, feels as though it's been submerged in a water tank.

 _Comrade. Partner. Former friend._

 _Rouge. Dead._

 _._

.

.

.

.

I like remembering the first day we met. It was like a universal conspiracy, a conglomerate of parameters that worked together on the only scope of bringing us together. We had only exchanged a dozen of words, and in a heartbeat we magically knew we would be able to see eye to eye.

But the most amazing fact of them all is, it took me a couple of days to realize how gorgeous you looked. You see, in the beginning what fascinated me most was the mere feeling of your presence nearby. I had been alone for so long, after all. Maybe it was simply that unbearable, suffocating loneliness that rendered me unable to discern the bottomless gulf that lied beneath the witty, headstrong woman I met that day.

And you know what really, really pisses me off? I trusted you. I showed you what nobody else was allowed to know- my demons, my fears. I saw a friend in you and let you hold my aching sadness within your two hands. I was, and still am, an utterly destroyed being, because you see, nobody accepts what they don't understand. I don't know what a normal person does or doesn't do, says or doesn't say, because I've never been one.

I understand, said she. If you let me, I will love you for what you are.

A child would have known better. A clinical retard would have detected the monstrous lie.

Not me.

I fell for it. All of it. Despite existing for over fifty years, my age experience-wise stopped at about the age of three. One moment I was comfortable being secluded from the rest of the world, following an agenda of my own. And then you came, and something resonated horribly. Substantial conversations, long walks, nerve-shattering sexual tension. We exchanged music, worked together, laughed with the same exact puns. Like a stupid teen, I unerringly came up with inventive new ways to touch you.

You insecure, dense idiot. You never suspected just how much I wanted to fuck you. You even questioned my fucking sexuality. Of course. You loved me for what I am, yes, but couldn't accept the fact that I was inexperienced, scared, and unabashedly hated whatever macho type of man society is expecting me to be.

But an anti social freak is supposed to say _thank you, your majesty_ , right? You really did believe that, by being attracted to someone less popular than you, you were doing me some kind of immense favor, didn't you, you fascist, sadist pig? Maybe the idea of fucking a, lemme remember, yes, a _gruesome experiment gone horribly wrong_ , looked so edgy it made your panties wet? Pffft.

Look around. Panic. I can no longer recognize the surrounding buildings. All those thoughts, all those remembrances, had me carried away. How much time has passed? Minutes? An hour? Two? The tiny clock next to the steering wheel has stopped working for some months now, and as soon as I fumble in my pockets I realize my cell phone is missing. It's probably lying forgotten on a desk at the police station. Or at your apartment. Oh, gee. It's not even afternoon yet and every minute of this cursed day runs me over as if it were a truck. Redemption. Absolution. Does any of this end?

There is a spacious gap between a motorbike and a jeep, and I take advantage of it before anyone else decides to. Door open, door closed. Car keys, check. I hold my hand against the sunlight that's suddenly bright enough to mortify my eyes. The outlines of a street sign become discernible, but the inscription rings no bells. Next to it, a bar miraculously materializes, and I decide to buy me a drink, calm down, and ask for directions.

Hey, Rouge, hear this: a gruesome experiment gone horribly wrong walks into a bar.

Hahahahaha. Because I am a fucking joke, ya geddit?

So, yes, I walk into the fucking bar. It is ridiculously early for this kind of pastime, so only a couple of heads turn around at the sound of the door. I am trying to decide whether the occasion goes better with straight vodka or straight whiskey, but then the waitress' head appears from behind the bench, and a smile illuminates her face. _Can I help you?_ She says. But she can't help me, and my heightening horror manifests itself before I can contain it. I turn on my heel and vanish.

She was a goddamn bat, and her blouse revealed a cleavage uncannily identical to yours.

Screw the bar. A walk will be far more relaxing and sobriety is more handy if I want to drive back home in one piece.

When we first kissed, it was the most awkward thing. I had no idea what to do and, despite that, you kept kissing and embracing me like a maniac. It was so surreal, so unlike any other experience in the universe, it almost felt as though I was not entitled to it. I touched you with trembling hands, fearing you might break to a thousand shards. I ran my tongue against yours, tasted your mouth, bit your jaw.

My palm did rest above your right breast. Funny that you mentioned that detail in your letter, because it was my favorite part. too. I wanted to go lower like a madman, feel in real life what had, for months, been a tormenting fantasy. I didn't.

Your skin was like porcelain.

I can still feel it, if I try.

The migraine only keeps aggravating. There is this sort of rhythmical pulse behind my eyes, and it hurts so badly they might even slip out of their sockets. Are you really dead? Was it my imagination? Unclenching my palm reveals the letter, reduced to a deplorable ball of paper between sweaty fingers. A peek at it reveals it still says the same horrific things. Accusations. Vitriol.

Unwantedly, I start considering things from your point of view. It was attraction among the mad, yes, but did I kill you?

Oh, lord. Did I? _Did I?_

I regrettably admit I was the one to put an end to it. It was by no means what I had wanted, because by that point you were already a part of me, but your insanity and neurotic shenanigans were starting to show. Argument after argument, reprimand after reprimand, it only got you a week or so to render perfectly clear that you didn't really love me, but instead, the idealized version of me your funny little brain had constructed. And so you shunned my flaws, rubbed my mistakes on my face, left me dumbstruck and forlorn, wondering where my best friend had gone and who the psychotic monster before me was.

You called me names, naturally. They were totally laughable and, needless to say, only helped me proceed with my decision, not just because I was disappointed, but because your inability to accept and love the broken, flawed, real Shadow only deepened the scars that had made me hate everyone else in the first place. What we shared had, momentarily, made me believe that there could be a place for me in the world. But nah. There was just you.

And since you are dead and I won't give you the satisfaction of letting you know this, here is something hilarious.

Yes, bitch. I loved you.

I love you.

Every abhorrent, selfish, deranged, lifeless inch of you.

Maria was my sunshine, my little sister, my happiness. You were a miserable soul that eventually riddled me with agony and self-loathing, and guess what. I love you more than I ever loved her. I love you in so many ways it actually gets confusing.

When we broke up rage ran so deep it was easy to convince myself I could move on. Seeing you every day at the GUN, however, made me feel like an utter piece of shit, for two reasons. First, because I hated you for taking my only family away from me, and second, because seeing you in all those sexy clothes you liked to wear, combined with the fact that we no longer talked, made me want to fuck you even more.

So I decided to make friends, see people, go out. Not because you were off the picture, idiot. Not because you never meant anything to me, you brainless emotional masochist. But because it was the only way to keep my mind occupied and stop thinking about us.

And when a comrade at the office told me that you and that goddamned echidna were back together, I patiently waited for time to pass, went home, and cried. You expected me to let it show? Really? Did you ever find the guts to walk up to me and declare all those feelings to my face? Ask for a reconciliation, even?

Nah.

"Hey, watch it, asshole!"

I look up, ready to apologize for bumping into a complete stranger. A white bat looks at me with aqua eyes that are identical to yours, and there is so much anger residing within them it is almost heartbreaking.

Suddenly, there is not enough air in the entire city. Take deep breaths, but instead of thinking more clearly I am only hyperventilating. What is this place? Why are all girls identical to you?

Wait. Waiwaiwaiwaiwait. Girls. The word girls wanders in my mind aimlessly for a second, then connects to several unpleasant nodes. An extended look at the surroundings only confirms the initial suspicion, like the marble pillar that conclusively seals a grave. Men are nowhere to be seen. There are female bats entering and exiting shops. There is a bakery at the end of the street, and the cashier, a white bat in a brown collar, smiles at me whimsically. As the traffic light in the distance flashes red, a bus stops right next to where I am practically suffocating. It's driver and six passengers, a bat in a blue uniform and six bats in casual clothing respectively, turn around and look at me.

They are sporting deranged smiles.

I start running, but the sun is surreally bright and there is nowhere to go. I know that I killed you, that all those years of suffering have built walls and defence systems that could easily destroy emotionally someone. I killed you because I could, and because, had you had the power, oh love, don't pretend you wouldn't have done the same.

Gravity is taking its toll on me, and I fall on my knees. The pain throbs at my temples, as vibrant as ever, and I shrink against the ground like a crumpled tin can as white female bats keep walking by. The unforgiving light bleeds through shut eyelids, and I am crawling, and crawling, and crawling, and screaming for help but no help comes. And I love you, I love you, I love every deceased inch of you, I love all your clones, I love the burned remains of your house.

Hands are grabbing me, dragging and shoving and screaming. They are only shapes against the glaring redness, but they seemingly mean well so I let myself collapse and wait for something to come. Something like a miracle. Something remotely reminiscent of redemption.

Open my mouth, try to force syllables out, but no sound is ultimately produced. I try, and try, and try to speak, but static bleeds through my throat and I end up vomiting on something warm and rigid, like some sort of badly made pillow. Or a stretcher.

There is nothing left to save me. The buzz of active conversation can distinctly be heard, and words like "breakdown" and "hallucinations" keep popping up. They voices are all calm and feminine, and they all belong to you, like some sort of freakish, computer generated song chorus.

We were indeed, created to cause one another harm, as it typically happens whenever two radically incompatible people throw logic out of the window and decide to have a go at it no matter what.

And, in this game of saint and pretender, you have won.

Not because you pushed me into this pitfall of madness.

But because, at this point of no return, all I wish is to use my own self-destruction as a way to hurt you as much as you hurt me.

And you are dead, and untouchable.

Like a boss.

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 **A.N.: Sorry for this.**


End file.
